


Epilogue to Just don’t run away by Sunfall_of_Ennien

by Merlioske



Category: Merlin (TV)
Genre: Gen, Justice Is Served, M/M, Time to pay the piper Uther you shitmuppet, Uther /gets/ punishment, Uther is a dick, Uther needs Punishment
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-17
Updated: 2020-08-17
Packaged: 2021-03-06 05:07:07
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,278
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25957981
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Merlioske/pseuds/Merlioske
Summary: so i started readingJust don’t run awaybySunfall_of_Ennien(summary below) and i was overcome with rage. rage at the shitmuppet extraordinaire, the one, the only, Uther himself. so. this fic was born. please, do read her magnificent work before attempting this, otherwise this won't make too much sense, i'm afraid.Summary of 'Just don't run away' -While it is Arthur's actions that incite the wrath of King Uther, it is Merlin's mouth--and his loyalty to Arthur--that get him into trouble.
Relationships: Merlin/Arthur Pendragon (Merlin)
Comments: 13
Kudos: 65





	Epilogue to Just don’t run away by Sunfall_of_Ennien

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Sunfall_of_Ennien](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Sunfall_of_Ennien/gifts).
  * Inspired by [Just Don't Run Away](https://archiveofourown.org/works/24062008) by [Sunfall_of_Ennien](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Sunfall_of_Ennien/pseuds/Sunfall_of_Ennien). 



> i wrote this while Sunfall was still working on her masterpiece of a fic and was sitting here, waiting anxiously for her to finish. now she has and so, here this is.
> 
> this is for you, Dearest, i hope you likey <3

~x~

The king of Camelot was feeling mighty pleased. It had been a good week, a great one, even, by all accounts – a couple days past, an evil, vile, sorcerer had been condemned and sentenced to death for magic most foul – he’d healed his son’s broken arm. Truly, will these people never learn? The insolence was staggering. However, he was promptly apprehended and a stop was put to his evil misdeeds.

Then, just yesterday, a disobedient son had been disciplined for being too decent a human being, his kindness being an eyesore, truly; and a beyond words loyal servant had been punished for his unwavering loyalty and standing for the Right Thing today. So, in the eyes of the king, all was right and well with the world.

Satisfied with job well and truly done (and paying no more mind to either the disobedient son, or his servant) the king got ready for bed. Well, his manservant got him ready for bed, but considering he was a servant and thus, obviously, far too below the king’s station to ever acknowledge in any way whatsoever, his help did not count.

With a pleased little sigh, the king snuggled into the bedsheets of his royal bed and prepared to sleep. After all, tomorrow was a new day and those always came with more jobs to do. No rest for the wick--- um, the great kings, that is.

Just as sleep was about to claim him, however, the king felt something off with his chambers. He sat up with a frown, blinked a few times, trying to get his eyes to adjust to the lack of light faster and…

“Oh, let me help you with that. Can’t really see in the darkness, can you?”

The candles around the room flared to life and the king immediately reached for his sword, while opening his mouth to yell for the guards.

Except… he didn’t. Do either of those things, that is. For the king was frozen where he sat, against his plumped up royal pillows in his decadent royal bed.

He couldn’t move, he couldn’t speak, all he _could_ do, was breathe. That, and watch as the figure, that was standing in the shadows until then, came into the light.

If he could have, the king would’ve frowned again. Alas, what with the not being able to move, he made do with throwing a mighty glare the figure’s way.

Moving closer to the bed, the figure threw off the hood that’s been covering their face and the king blinked. A woman stood before him. He had no idea who she was. He would have been intrigued, if not for the fact that he still could not bloody move, meaning she was a sorceress, _which_ meant, that she Had to Die Immediately. Alas, hard to give the order for execution, when one’s mouth is stuck shut. So the king did what he could, which was – he pouted Very Loudly, as he watched the woman plop down at the foot of his bed, while he gave her the stink eye.

After a couple of minutes of silent observation, the woman tsk’ed, shook her head and then huffed a major sigh. Then she opened her mouth, and for the first time that night, the king was glad for the inability to move as he had most definitely had flinched otherwise.

“Uther, Uther, Uther.” The woman began and the disdain in her voice could have curdled milk. “You are such a bloody bastard.”

The king bristled – he was no bastard, thank you very much! His parentage was pure and royal and --- his inner rant was interrupted by the woman speaking again.

“Tonight, you sad little dung-beetle, is the night of your reckoning. I am your deliverance, you fucker, and I am _not_ feeling generous.”

_Dung-beetle???_ The king thought enraged, but, as his gob was still sealed shut, all he could do was rage In Silence.

“So, for the countless, and I mean that quite literally, by the way, crimes against your people and Humanity in general, to be quite honest, I am hereby going to deliver you your dues.” She smiled at him. Her teeth were pointy. They looked sharp. It was not a pretty sight.

“First. And yes, I am going to list things out. Why, you may ask. Well, because I can. Hah! Now, first. For the crime of being an absolutely disastrous father to the most precious children ever ---“ Her smile grew at his obvious panic at her saying ‘children’, “You are hereby sentenced to feel, whenever they feel anything negative towards you henceforth. And I do mean anything.”

She rolled her eyes at his obvious attempt at scowling. “Save it. You may think they both adore you and worship the ground you walk on, because, hello, delusional much? But we’ll see. Oh yes, we’ll certainly see…

“Second. For the crime of not only neglecting, but terrorizing your own people, for instilling Fear as their default emotion, you are sentenced to be constantly afraid. And just like them you too shall have no clue whatsoever about _what_ it is exactly that should scare you.

“For the crime of breaking your oath, given by you on the day of your coronation – for breaking the oath of being a fair, just and compassionate ruler, you are sentenced to be Doubted and Challenged by those you hold in the highest regard.

“For the crime of punishing Good Deeds with pain and suffering, you are sentenced to henceforth experience each of your own unjust rulings on yourself – as your people suffer, so shall you, be it by rotten fruit, lashing or spending a night in a cold, wet cell. Judge them untrue – and you shall suffer too.

“For the crime of dismissal, neglect and abuse of your only son – well… there’s really no punishment enough for that, is there. Especially considering the limitations of therapy in this age, but for starters – you are sentenced to know each and every time that he is helped. That he is cared for, that he is cherished. You are sentenced to _know_ when he is saved. You are sentenced to know that, _despite_ how you mistreat him, humiliate and break him… he is not, nor will he ever be alone. _You_ do not matter. For he is already and will continue to be a great man, who in turn will become a great king, because he knows the true value of his people. And his people, Uther, will hail him and will forget _you_ as one forgets a bad fart.

“For the crime of being foul, and yes, that’s a crime, duh, you’re sentenced to always smell your foulness, lest you forget you are, in fact, foul. I doubt you’re going to mind that too much, considering you’ve bedded a troll, for how long, again? Ah, not that it matters, moving on.

“For the crime of never listening to those wiser than you, you are sentenced to sneeze, every time you attempt to speak without first thinking it through trice over.

“And, last but not least, for being blind to things you should never be blind to, you are sentenced to _see_. Everything important that happens around you. You shall see, but you shall never be able to _do_ anything about it. You shall be a quiet observer of the lives of those closest to you. You shall witness their joys, their achievements, their successes. And you will not be able to fuck it up in any way.

“You know what, I damn near forgot. For caring more about satisfying your ego, than the joys and love and faithfulness, for paying no mind to the warnings of what your greed would cost, each step you take from this moment on will feel like stepping on heated needles. Each breath you take will feel like inhaling water. Each bite you eat will make you nauseous. Each sip of drink will only help to increase your thirst. Each moment you will live feeling the weight heavy on your back. You will feel, what she felt, every day she carried him under her heart. Unlike her however, you will never find any joy in any of it. For there is no magic in you. No love. You’ve no idea what those emotions feel like. Never did. Never will. So unlike her, you will not find joy in it. You won’t find the suffering worth it.

“Try to speak of this to anyone and your tongue shall swell until it’s too big for your mouth and you choke. Try to write this down and your hands will rot and fall off. Try to do anything even remotely resembling an attempt to mess with your sentence, and I will be back. For I, Uther, am ever watching. And I _will_ catch you if you fuck up.

“On second thought…” Her smile was back and the king felt cold sweat breaking out all over his skin. “ _Do_ fuck up. _Please_.”

She stood then, and pulled a big, menacing looking bag from seemingly nowhere. Placing it on the bed, she opened it up and gave the king another smile. It was even worse than the last one.

“Now, just so you’d know what to expect in case you try to cross me.”

And she pulled out of the bag and placed on the bed – a long string, twenty little needles and a cactus.

The king began to sweat in earnest.

~x~

In the morning, the king woke, his mood sour. He had had the most viciously terrible of dreams last night. There had been a woman and, and she was a vile, evil sorceress and she had… she had these _needles_ and then there was a cactus, of all things…and… The king shook his head with a shudder and stood up from the bed, promptly collapsing to the floor, pain scorching through…well, all of him. He looked to his fingers, expecting to see them still bleeding, but there were no marks. Just the echoing pain of having had needles stuck under his fingernails.

The king struggled to his feet and got dressed with shaking hands. And if he was limping and moving far slower than usual as he left his chambers, well, he was the king, who’d dare to comment?

~x~

To say that the following days were easy would have been… not quite truthful. The king had found, that all that foul-mouthed sorceress had spewed the night before was actually coming to pass – ever since getting up that following morning, every step he took felt like walking upon heated needles. No matter how deep or shallow the king tried to breathe – he just couldn’t get enough air into his lungs. At first taste of his breakfast, the king damn near puked it all back out. And the thirst… with every cup of wine it grew and grew and… and that wasn’t even the worst part – the king’s back felt like it’s been broken it hurt so bad. The king ended up walking hunched over half the time in a completely useless attempt of alleviating the pain, yet when asked, all he could say about the matter were assurances he’s fine.

Then, he had experienced the distinct feeling of Morgana’s annoyance. It came on so sudden and so strong it stopped him in his tracks. After managing to sneakily observe his war---oh fine, his _daughter_ for a short while, he managed to piece together that she was annoyed at him for not giving out, what she considered to be, ‘enough’ provisions to the elder people of Lower Town. Uther huffed – it was not something he’d been willing to listen to her about. Yet one of the many, many things he had dismissed as being ‘not important enough’. And so what if she was annoyed? She’d move on soon enough.

… three days later, the feeling of annoyance had not diminished in the least. Uther sent a wagon of bread to the Lower Town.

While Morgana’s annoyance had disappeared, the constant nagging feeling of sheer, utter _fear_ was now a solid and unmovable companion to the king. However, as was his usual way with many many, way too many things, the king simply chose to ignore the inconvenience and moved on. And if his sleep suffered from it? Well, Gaius wasn’t a Court Physician for nothing and his potions did work wonders. Even if they came with the _mildly_ inconvenient side effect of _mildly_ painful urinating. After a few sleepless nights, the king had deemed the inconvenience too slight to not keep a supply of the potion close at hand before bed.

Strange things, however, kept on happening. Like in the Council meeting one morning, lord Brayers, one of Uther’s staunchest supporters, had not only very openly disagreed with something the king had said, but had also challenged his ability to rule over a flock of sheep, much less a kingdom.

He had then proceeded to state that, _of course_ the kingdom’s subjects did not respect the king, as who _would_ respect someone who dressed like _that._ He had then finally concluded that he had absolutely _no_ idea what Uther was still even doing on the throne when it was plain as day for all to see that it was high time for the crown prince to take over. Deathly silence had followed the lord’s words, while everyone sat in shock, lord Brayers most of all.

After storming out of the Council meeting (simply storming, as he could _do_ nothing to lord Brayers, could _say_ nothing even, try as he might, and boy did he try… however, all that _that_ had achieved was the increasing purpling of his own face) ignoring his son’s shouts to wait, the king slammed straight into a young servant boy, making the lad drop a huge bowl of hot soup. Uther sent the boy to the stocks and then spent the rest of the afternoon feeling how rotten fruit and vegetables pelted him all over. It was not a pleasant feeling. Nor was the black eye that had suddenly appeared on his face easy to explain.

There were also, however, good moments. Those tended to happen mostly when his son was running about his duties, his servant always on his heels. Uther, in spite of himself, had noticed that whenever the prince had need of, well, anything, the servant boy was there, with whatever it was needed, most of the time, before the prince had so much as opened his mouth. That’s when the pricks of ‘happy, good, cared for’ would happen. For some reason, seeing his son taken care of so well, made something tighten rather painfully in the king’s chest.

No matter how many times the king had ordered his chambers cleaned, no matter how many scented baths he took… he could always smell it. The scent of his ex-wife’s most lovely stench – the stench of troll. The king had tried everything to get rid of it. He went so far as to pour rose water down his nose. Nothing helped.

Also, the king seemed to have developed allergies all of a sudden. Most days, anyone in the castle could manage to avoid the king by simply listening to where the mighty sneezes were coming from. And yet, despite this… the king’s ridiculous decrees didn’t seize. Thus the sneeze-fest continued, much to the relief of the serving staff. It was so much easier to avoid the tyran--- um, the king, when you knew precisely when to hide.

But the absolute worst? Oh, the thing most terrible, was the fact that the king did end up _seein_ g things. Things that he had wished with all his might to unsee.

The first time he felt it – the pleasant tingly feeling coming from his son, he was curious. So, obviously, he went looking. However, no matter where he looked, he could not find him. Finally, half a candle mark later, the king gave up with a shrug and was on his way back to his chambers when he went by what was supposed to be an empty guest chamber. The sounds coming from within disproved the empty theory however. The king was about to continue on his way had he not recognized the voice from behind the door.

“ _Mer_ lin…”

The king froze. That… did not sound like a reprimand. That sounded like a plea.

“Oh gods _, yes._ Mmm… just like that, gods, Merlin, that _mouth_ of yours…”

Mortified, the king hurried along. Well, there was nothing wrong with his son simply… enjoying some relief, was there. He was, after all, the crown prince. It was no more than was his due. Not to mention, no danger of royal bastards was always a good thing.

That would have been that, if not for the fact that it kept… on… repeating. The king seemed unable to _not_ stumble onto his son… enjoying his manservant all over the castle. But it was fine. He was the crown prince, he had many responsibilities, he deserved some stress relief. It was fine. All was fine. Until it wasn’t.

One day, the king was assaulted by such strong sense of giddiness, such intense feeling of accomplishment? The king had to lean on the wall as not to fall right over. He was used to the pleased little blips by now, and actively avoided any strolling down the corridors of his castle while they had not passed, but this… this was new. The king had to admit, he was curious.

What he found, however, left him feeling more than slightly ill.

“Arthur… are you… are you certain?”

The king frowned. The boy sounded unsure. He crept closer to the closed door of his son’s chambers. 

“How many times are you going to ask me again? Yes, I’m sure. Yes, it’s fine. Don’t you … don’t you want to?”

There was a soft chuckle, followed by an even softer, “You know I always want you. But we’ve never done it this way and---”

He was interrupted by something that was blessedly silent. Still, the king frowned, having witnessed quite a few times of the two men embracing, he was fairly certain he knew exactly _how_ his son had shut his servant up. Then, however, the prince was speaking again. “And yet, I trust you. I know you’ll take care of me. So. Get on with it and take me already.”

The king turned a weird greenishly gray colour and fled. He attempted to flee loudly, as in, screaming bloody murder and raging to all that’d be unfortunate enough to cross his path, however, upon opening his mouth, he found he couldn’t let out so much as a peep – his tongue had swollen and now felt like a huge sausage, being stuffed down his throat.

Uther shuddered – after what he had just witnessed, sausages being stuffed in throats or… _in other places_ were really, _really,_ the wrong metaphors to be thinking in.

Feeling more than slightly ill, the king came to a quick decision that the only proper way to handle his son’s new budding romance and his… _sexual explorations_ would be to drink himself into a stupor, increasing thirst be damned.

And so, off he went, to get nice and sloshed. And the kingdom rested, finally at peace, as her king was thoroughly indisposed. And all was well. And the sorceress, watching it all unfold in the clear water of her scrying bowl, from her own castle, while drinking a very expensive, very old and very delicious vintage (straight from Uther’s personal collection, obviously) cackled. She _so_ loved her job.

~x~

**Author's Note:**

> thank you so much, if you gave this a shot.  
> i'd love to hear your thoughts~  
> xoxoxo

**Works inspired by this one:**

  * [The Sorceress of Righteous Vengeance](https://archiveofourown.org/works/26158597) by [Sunfall_of_Ennien](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Sunfall_of_Ennien/pseuds/Sunfall_of_Ennien)




End file.
